


When Ryan Came Blazing In

by jeahwriting



Category: Olympics RPF, Swimming RPF
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-11-11
Updated: 2012-11-11
Packaged: 2017-11-25 18:55:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 876
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/641955
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jeahwriting/pseuds/jeahwriting
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p> <i>Michael didn’t like it—this thing with Ryan.</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	When Ryan Came Blazing In

  


Michael didn’t like it—this thing with Ryan.  He didn’t like how he could literally spend all his time in Ryan’s room, listening to “Sky’s the Limit” over and over again.  How he could talk to Ryan for hours on end without a single lull in the conversation.  How he could just show up on Ryan’s doorstep and step into his life as if that’s where he had always belonged.  He didn’t like how he could get completely lost in Ryan.  How time just got away from him when Ryan was talking or kissing or laughing. 

  


He didn’t like it because he still had to swim.  He still had medals to win—and this time around, he wanted to win them all.  He wanted to show everyone that he really was the greatest Olympian of all time.  That he was better than Beijing—that Beijing was just a starting point. 

  


And that was hard to remember when Ryan was there.  It was so easy to forget his charts and his times when Ryan had his hand gripped in his and he was dragging him off to some stupid movie or some concert that he ‘really, really wanted to see’. 

  


He didn’t like it because, for all these years, Michael had a pretty good grip on his life.  He had control over everything and he had spent a good deal of time making sure things were just how he wanted them.  He had scheduled in time for his family, time for his friends, time to go out and have some fun—and most importantly, he had scheduled in time for extra training.  After his scheduled practices and in any down time, Michael hit the weight room or the pool for some extra laps—because that’s what Olympians did.  You don’t just become the greatest Olympian of all time by sitting on your ass and going to scheduled practices—practices that anyone with a bit of cash could go to.  You put in the extra time.  You swim the extra lap.  You put in the extra effort.

  


And that’s what Michael’s life was.  Or at least what it had been before Ryan came blazing into his life and into his pants a little after Beijing.  Before Ryan, his life was a scheduled chart of training times and food tables.  And honestly, Michael thought that anyone that didn’t have that kind of control over their lives was fucking stupid.  Like how could you let the little stupid things distract you from the bigger things?  The bigger things that mattered.  He couldn’t understand, for the life of him, how people let other people and everyday moments take over their lives so completely.

  


That is, until Ryan came along.  Ryan came along and Michael suddenly understood all those love songs.  He understood what it felt like to be completely and utterly caught up in the moment and forget about everything else in the entire world.  He understood what it meant to be happy—not when he was gripping a gold medal or when he just broke a world record—but to be happy just sitting on Ryan’s couch, with a cup of hot chocolate in his hand, and just living for right then.  Not thinking about the future or the number of laps he had to swim tomorrow, but just feeling what he felt, open and without restriction. 

  


That was new territory.  Michael felt like he had to redefine his entire life and set up new boundaries because now Ryan was taking over his thoughts and Michael didn’t really know what to do about that.  Sometimes it scared the living daylights out of him, because Michael didn’t really _want_ to hit the gym after practice anymore.  He didn’t want to swim the extra laps—he just wanted to go home to Ryan and see him smile and kiss him under their covers. 

  


And that was fucking frightening because Michael felt like he was losing control.  He felt like he couldn’t trust himself, because he wasn’t doing things that were good for him anymore.  He wasn’t pushing himself.  He wasn’t setting out-of-reach goals like he used to.  He felt himself settling—and what was even scarier was that he liked settling.  He _liked_ coming home early and fucking Ryan instead of spending that time at the pool.

  


And maybe that was best.  Live in the present and shit, right?  And he really did believe that he knew deep down, in some part of his gut, what he should do.  So if, his body and mind were telling him to just relax and be with Ryan and not freak out about his times, he should just listen, right?

  


Michael just hoped that this thing was all for the best.  He hoped that he would be able to pull himself together in time to make it past trials.  He hoped that he’d be able to swim fast enough to rake in some Olympic medals.  And he hoped that he could do all that with Ryan by his side.  Because Michael really did love that boy and he hoped to God that he wouldn’t have to choose between Ryan and swimming. 

  


Cause Michael really didn’t think he had it in him to make that choice.


End file.
